Hi guys. Wally here. July is Pet Hydration Month and once again we’re teaming up with the folks at PetSafe® Brand to help spread the word about the importance of water for your pets and proper pet hydration. Many pet parents don’t realize that keeping their pets properly hydrated is as important as feeding them wholesome foods.

Proper hydration can help cats and dogs with things like:

Preventing urinary tract infections and urinary disease

Promoting healthy kidney function

Aiding with energy levels and regulating body temperatures

Speeding recovery time from sickness or surgery

Did you know that cats and dogs need about one ounce of water per pound of body weight? That means that I…weighing around 14 pounds…need to drink about 14 ounces of water each day to stay properly hydrated. And ever since I got sick last fall and found out my ol’ kidneys aren’t working as good as they used to, the mom has become more aware of the amount of water that I drink. Staying hydrated helps flush my kidneys and keeps them working better.

Not drinking enough water can lead to dehydration which can be pretty serious. Signs of dehydration include:

Vomiting and/or diarrhea

Lack of energy

Excessive and ongoing panting

Loss of appetite

Sunken, dry eyes

Dry and sticky gums

Loss of skin elasticity

If your pet exhibits these symptoms, you’ll want to make sure he or she is seen by a vet as soon as possible.

Many cats don’t drink enough water. So how do you make sure your cat is drinking enough? Well, one way is to feed them canned food which contains lots of moisture. I eat mostly canned food so I get a lot of my daily water intake that way. But another way of getting water is by actually drinking it, which most of us cats don’t do enough of. So making water attractive to us cats can help to entice us to drink more.

Many cats, me included, like the sight and sound of running water. A fountain is a great way to give your cat fresh, clean, running water to drink without having to leave the water faucet on all day.

It holds 1 gallon of water which makes it great for cats and small or medium size dogs…or for multi-pet households. The carbon filter in it keeps the water fresh longer and free from bad tastes and odors. It comes with 5 different interchangeable spouts so you can decide if you want 1 stream or up to 5 streams of water. It was really easy to set up…even the mom figured it out…and it’s easy to clean, too. You can put it in the dishwasher if you want. Just don’t put the pump in there. It’s fairly quiet…the sound of the falling water is quite zen-like.

*SLURP* This water is SO refreshing! I’m getting my daily water intake. Is your cat drinking enough water?

If you want to learn more about the Drinkwell® 360 Multi-Pet Stainless or any of the other PetSafe Brand pet fountains, visit their website. You can also follow Petsafe Brand on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.

Now for the fun part. We’re giving away a pet fountain! That’s right! The PetSafe® Brand folks are generously allowing us to give away a Drinkwell® 360 Multi-Pet Stainless pet fountain to one of our readers. The giveaway is for those in the U.S. only. Just use the Rafflecopter form below for your chance to win. You have through July 24, 2017 to enter. Void where prohibited. The winner will be notified by email and will have 48 hours in which to claim the prize or else another winner will be chosen. Good luck!

Disclosure: We received the PetSafe® Brand Drinkwell® 360 Multi-Pet Stainless pet fountain for free when we agreed to help spread the word about Pet Hydration Month, but that did not influence our opinion at all. The Island Cats will always give a fair and honest review, and will only share information that we feel is relevant to our readers.

Hey, put out a birdbath and keep it very clean. I drink out of our birdbath with great pleasure…waiting for birds, heh, heh. Papa cleans it every day and there is 1 drop (literally) of Clorox in 10 litres of water so it’s not harmful, but always clean.

Oh, we’d love a fontain, but we live outside the US (we do of course understand that postage is way too expensive overseas!)

Our stupid Mom gives us kibbles only as treats. We love them, and so do many cats, but they’re (in Mom’s opinion at least) unhealthy. Mom mixes our wet food with water, and that way she makes sure that we drink enough.

I know all three of my dogs would gladly drink from this. As for my cats, I think they will. Especially Arata and Kotoha. My old girl, Moko, has gotten picky and set in her ways and isn’t doing the best lately. Of course, anything that encourages her to drink enough fresh water is good for me!

We have that fountain and we love it! The only thing is mom wishes you could by the rubber rings that go around the filter holder all by themselves. They don’t last very long, and it’s dumb that you have to replace the whole filter housing just to get a new ring.

That is one cool fountain! We love to drink from running water so we know we’d love that! Thank you for such an informative post Wally. We learned some things from you that we didn’t know and we’re sure others will too!

Good job, Walley! I heard great things about this fountain and bought it for Peaches & Paprika. The fountain was great, easy to set up and use and I wanted to go Stainless Steel for Safety reasons. Unfortunately my little devils decided they were terrified of it! They approached it many times, then ran away. Maybe they thought the bogeyman would come out of the fountain. Anyway I applaud those who use it,. it’s definitely a great thing to do for your sweet furrrballs.- signed, Carol the human

How timely! We’re dealing with UTI’s here with our Cashmere and I have been wondering about her water intake. I’ve been trying to keep an eye on her to see if she does drink enough, but she does not make it easy for me! Looks like you love your fountain! I’m going to enter, paws crossed!

WOW……that’s a totally cool fountain…………I only eat dry food which my Mom is upset about but that’s what I guess I was fed for the 11 months before Mom and Dad adopted me! Hydration is a big deal for me and I love water from the faucets…..we should have a fountain on all three floors at my house! (hahahaha)

Pawsome post, Wally! Given Mudpie’s relentless wet food aversion I’m so, so happy that she enjoys drinking water (although she still probably isn’t getting all she should). A coffee mug all her own is her favorite place to take a slurp!

We have the plastic model that our mom got specifically for our old sis Sophie back in 2010. We still love it! In fact, Mom was checking out the stainless steel one a while back but found it kinda expensive. She has a tip for you kids, though–get a refillable filter. She’ll look up the details for it if you want. Since we were going through filters like crazy, this was a much more cost effective solution for us.

Thank you for putting this information about water out there. So many humans do not know how impawtant this is. When and if we get a fountain that looks like a good one. For now we only drink purified bottled water and lots of if with our food and we really mean with our food – one little can of food to one little can of water goes in our dish and we lap it all up like crazy!

great article. Alex loved to drink water out of the sink, but Lucy hardly ever drinks water out of her bowl and never from the sink… I worry she doesn’t drink enough, but she does have 2 cans of wet food a day

Our Samantha has a PetSafe fountain (a different one than this) and she LOVES it. I never worry about her drinking enough water! I want to get another one for the dogs someday too (we had one before but it got broken when we moved).

That is so great to have a chance to win one of those fountains! Pipo had one in the past and he played in it…I am sure he and dog-guy would love a nice stainless steel one to drink cool refreshing water from.

Oh yes, definitely! My oldest cat – 2 years old – is OBSESSED with water. I think she would seriously get a kick out of this fountain. And the youngest one is 2 1/2 months old and is learning about everything right now… so I think he would catch onto the fountain quickly.

I wish our cats were interested in our fountain. If I win, I’ll bring it to PAWS. The only time Rufus is interested in his water bowl is if I drop an ice cube in the water. He loves to hunt it! Until it mysteriously disappears…
xxoo